Northyros: March of the Death-Mammoths

[Mizagium]

The Mechanist King drummed his mechanical fingers on the arm of his throne. Rurik approached the clearly impatient king with…troubling news.

“There you are, Rurik,” the King grumbled. “What’s the news on Jeffrey and company?”

“Interesting, to say the least,” he answered levelly. “They have only just acquired the Southryos keystone.” He continued, despite the king’s raised eyebrows. “They appear to have become embroiled in the D.W.A.R.F. tournament and so were held up by that.”

“What…what in the world? Why?”

“It seems as though there was a wedding between…” he skimmed his notes. “Two dragons, sire. Ah, I see. One Pterodactyl and one half-dragon, half-Pterodactyl. Evidently, such a union brings together the disparate houses of the exiled Pterodactyl clan from The Secluded and Tropical Nation of Koosalagoopagoopakuzbekistanahamas. It’s quite the momentous occasion.”

No doubt,” he sighed. “Are they at least moving?”

“Yes, to Northyros now.”

“Hopefully Salma and Evennia were sitting on their hands that whole time.”

-

Evennia was still fuming over the loss of Zelmon when the Mysterious Benefactor appeared in her camp. The Chaos-infused machines all knelt deferentially to him, which bothered Evennia more than a little, but she held her tongue.

“So sorry to hear about Zelmon,” he announced coldly. “Good help is so hard to find these days.”

“To what do I owe this…pleasure?” The Queen of Storms did not bow or show any sign of deference towards the enigmatic figure.

“Oh you know me – harbinger of good fortune.”

“Mhm.”

“I’ve just been to the southern front and it seems the Queen of Blades means to move on you.” Evennia frowned but didn’t say anything at first. “Once she solidifies her hold on Southryos, she intends to eliminate you before advancing into Centros proper.”

“And…you expect me to believe you?”

“Don’t you?”

“Not nearly as far as I can throw you.”

“After all I’ve done for you – you still don’t trust me?” He sighed theatrically. “I suppose children are ungrateful no matter how you raise them. And here I thought you might be different.”

Evennia rolled her eyes. “Everything you did for me, you did for her.”

“Point,” he conceded. “But I suggest you being moving eastward regardless.”

He vanished as quickly as he came. She had long since made it a point to consider everything that man said a lie, or possessing some ulterior motive. No doubt he had told Salma something similar – or was about to. Sadly, she was much more inclined to believe his honeyed words than she. And that only meant what he said was true, after a fashion.

“Move….east,” she commanded uncertainly. “We take Esteros and await a move from the Queen of Blades.”

-

It was a wonderful day in the land of Northyros: the snow was falling, the Vikings were pillaging, and the magisters remained holed up in their mysterious fortress.

“ – move out,” Jeff finished his sentence from Esteros. The world spun briefly while he got his bearings. This land was not nearly as inviting as the previous. The permafrost crunched under his shoes. Thick gray clouds blotted out the sun. Mountains appeared to ring the entire area, but the interior itself was flat. Somewhere off in the distance, a great peak reached for the heavens, and a large castle perched precariously at the summit.

The murmur of human voices drew his attention to his left. A crowd of people were gathered around something. One among them, a priest of some sort, spoke solemn words. Jeff motion for the others to follow and felt a crumpled paper in his hands he hadn’t possessed earlier.

Jeff.

Khilbron missing. Sent to Magisters; never checked in.

Locate before Red Keystone – very important.

Gallen Kah, Keymaster

“Yeah, we’ll get there,” he muttered to an Immortal who couldn’t hear him. “Let’s see if these sad peasant folk can show us the way.”

More curious about the gathering than anything, Jeff ever so casually joined the group and conjured up some barrier stairs in order to get a good look. Everyone was gathered around what appeared to be a giant footprint, and in that footprint (which had depressed an ovoid section of the ground out three feet) sprawled a mangled young man, evidently deceased.

“…And as we commend his soul to the realm of whichever Demon Lord presently has claim over him,” the priest finished, “let us all remember, at least it wasn’t me.”

“At least it wasn’t me,” the intoned, tossed a handful of dirt over the corpse and began to disperse.

“Uh, excuse me,” Jeff called to the crowd. A few of them glanced up at him (as he was still elevated). “What happened here?”

“The Mammoths,” a few declared, as if that explained everything, and moved along quickly.

Jeff turned and faced the group. “So…that was weird,” he said, throwing up his hands.

[Myrdraxxis]

"Ohoooo boy." Magnus groaned, realizing where they were. "I had hoped to never see this place again." Magnus approached the mangled corpse that the funeral procession had just abandoned, making a motion across his chest -tracing a crucifix with a raised middle finger- and quickly lighting up a cigar he pulled from somewhere to negate his rising panic attack.

"Uh, where are we exactly?" Leske ventured.

"Northyros." Magnus replied gravely. Leske's face paled.

"We probably shouldn't stay in one place for too long." Magnus advised. "They probably already know we're here."

"Who, the Magisters?"

"Worse. The Mammoths."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Things are beginning to heat up in Centros." Eldrin mused, hovering (literally) over Septimus' shoulder as the young commander reviewed the latest reports from the front lines. Or what was left of the front lines. Truth be told the Mechanist King's army was all but gone, his top generals in rebellion and fighting over the scraps of Centros' southern lands and the surrounding regions. Northyros had all but secured control of the everything north of the Tower.

"About time." Septimus muttered. "We've just been sitting here since Hero's Refuge fell."

"Not for much longer." Eldrin said, as Septimus opened the next letter. He stared at it for a moment.

"They're....calling me back to Northyros."

[Calefrun]

Cetis, having woken up from his nap after the portal deposited him and the others, glanced around himself. "So, this is Northyros, huh?" He casually walked over to Jeff, then jumped up and front-flipped onto his shoulders. "Ay Lobster, Imma get me one of dem mammoths to kill all the shrimpers with, ya dig?" He reached into his pocket, and pulled out a handful of spaghetti. "Awww yeah, gurl." He proceeded to slap said spaghetti onto his face, after which it was slowly absorbed into the squid-head.

He then began to stare down at Jeff expectantly with his never-changing happy face.

[Sariel of Tevet]

The Dayman and company fell into Northyros and the chill of the harsh land rose through their bodies. Not amused by the cold in the way that common filth are, The Dayman pressed a button on his codpiece and it began to hum slightly as the heater turned on. Diane chose to hold onto her husband instead of activating her codwarmer.

"Oh Ali, isn't this snow beautiful? I wish it would snow more often on the island."

"Yes my love, however it would bring too many vagabonds along with it. See, just look over there."

He pointed at the funeral procession trailing off into the distance.

"Hobos dear, snowy lands are lousy with them."

He saw Cetis perched upon the shoulders of Jeff, staring down at a sizable crater in the ground, and took his wife's hand. Follow me dear. He ran and jumped atop Cetis' shoulders, and perched quite comfortably, while Diane took her place on The Dayman's shoulders. Hobotron mumbled in binary, after shooting a sexy glance at his robowife, and jumped atop Diane's shoulders before Lady Hobotron took her place on her robohusband's shoulders.

"Aww"

Prince Elton sighed as he floated towards the group.

"I wish I could perch on someone's shoulders."

Instead, he made his way to Jeff and wrapped his ghostly arms around the ambivalent leader, and nuzzled his chin against Jeff's neck.

[Mizagium]

*Quarter-circle back + kick*

Jeff performed a tatsumaki and whirlwind-kicked CETIS, The Dayman, Dianae, the Hoboduo, and Prince Elton (but especially the Dayman) off of him. "Has anybody seen Xeltyr?" he asked, suddenly aware that they were down one flying wind demon from that totem pole of himself. "Oh, it doesn't matter. One less silly character the better." Before the other could recover, he drew Magnus aside.

"You've been here, before, right? Do you know where we can find the magisters?"

[Myrdraxxis]

Magnus sighed again, glancing around furtively, and seeing no sign of approaching death-mammoths turned his attention fully to Jeff. "Yeah, I know where to find em alright." He cast a look around the small village. "I think this town is Kemlow. Small place, near the Icebound River. Which means we're about a day and a half's walk from the capital." he observed.

"And that's important because...." The Bread Wizard piped up. Dear gods, was he still around? What the fizz...

Anyway

"Because the Magisters rule from there. Specifically, from their little slice of heaven, Blackspire. It's where the COuncil presides and the Archmage rules." he explained with a grimace. "Jeff. Are you sure that's where we need to go? I'm generally a badass but..."

He paused, a thoughtful frown forming on his face. "I used to be a member of the Magister Council. Left when the Archmage took power. I...I've been alive for a very long time and seen a lot. But that man...he scares the crap out of me."

[Mizagium]

Jeff reluctantly showed Magnus the note. "It's from the Keymaster himself - Gallen Kah. Khilbron is supposed to help us locate the Red Keystone, but he's gone missing. I'm of the mind that he wouldn't give me this message unless it was important. And besides," Jeff glanced over at the others. "We have the Dayman. Hioma. You. and CETIS. My power keeps growing and at the very least the Bread Wizard and the Mooketeers can be a distraction. And even if that isn't enough, we still have no idea where the Keystone is; it doesn't seem like anyone we've met knows about them much."

He ground his teeth a moment. "Please, Magnus. We need to get there. Preferably without getting trampled."

[Myrdraxxis]

"Just be on guard." Magnus warned. "If we make it past the mammoths we'll have a lot worse to deal with." he turned and took stock of the group.

"Alright people!" He called. "Blackspire is that-a-way," he pointed off in a random direction. West I guess. "Stay close and keep alert and we might just make it through this un-trampled."

With that he snapped his fingers and a long under-used sedan chair. He could feel Leske, Desmond and Ash staring at him as he sat down and waited.

And waited.

"Ahem." he said after a minute.

"No." Was all Leske replied with.

The two stared at one another for a long moment before Leske sighed and submitted, eliciting a groan from the other three, who resignedly took their places and carried Magnus off towards that direction I just mentioned.

[Calefrun]

Cetis jumped onto the back of Magnus' chair and began to do the mammoth dance.

"It won't be long now..."

[Sariel of Tevet]

"Death Mammoths you say? The only thing worse than a vagrant pachyderm is a dead vagrant pachyderm I suppose. Hmmm."

The Dayman hopped into the cockpit of Hobotron and started to hit some arbitrary buttons. Nothing really happened, apparently most buttons aren't even connected to anything, they are just there for show. However he did find a dial for elephant, and then just turned it to hairy elephant. A green radar pulled up on the screen and started beeping steadily.

"Diane, honey, see if Lady Hobotron has a radar as well, this one doesn't quite seem to be working."

Diane gracefully found her way into a seat and found no mammoth or elephant radar, but she did however find a dial with a skull and crossbones. She turned the dial and her radar flashed with a bright blue color, and The Dayman's radar changed to blue as well. Dots appeared on their radars, but quite far away, for now.

"Ali my dear, I suppose that your hairy elephant radar and my death radar have synched up and shown us the locations of the Death Mammoths. Magnus if you lead us to the mage place, then we can be on the look out for the Death Mammoths."

[Mizagium]

~Earth: Years Ago~

"Jeff."

Jeff gripped the phone with both hands, pressing it close to his face. He spoke in hushed tones directly into the receiver. "Sam! What's going on? There's men in black suits all over the neighborhood. They say - "

"Listen, Jeff. I need you to trust me. Can you do that?"

"Sam, what's going on?" He peeked around the corner, scanning the room for his parents. Hopefully they won't notice the cord trailing into the next room. "Who are they?"

"Jeff. Do you trust me?"

"Of course."

"Good." He heard her sigh into the phone. "Now listen. Whatever they say - the black suits - don't listen to them. They want what I have, but I can't give it to them. Not them. Maybe not anyone. So I'm going to have to go away for a while, ok?"

"No! Sam! I don't understand." He knew he was crying and yelling.

"Jeff I-"

Someone else on the other end shouted "Sam! They're here!"

"I love you, kid."

"Sam, no!"

"Be good. I'll see you."

"Sam!"

~Northyros: Now~

Jeff shook out of his reverie, aware that he had been staring off into the tundra. Where had that memory surfaced from? He hadn't thought about Sam in years. She was gone, dead, as far as the Valentine family was concerned. The police had stopped searching. The FBI and Interpol had stopped searching. She vanished and no trace of her had resurfaced in years.

Well, almost. Jeff reached for his cell phone, dead for some time now, that contained the last recorded presence of Samantha Valentine, three years after her disappearance. He hadn't played that message in years, but now he was overtaken by the desire to do so.

He flipped it open (it was old) and pressed the power button. Dead.

"Anyone?" He waved the phone over his head. "Anyone got a phone charger? Or some kind of magic or whatever to make this thing work?"

-----

Olaf Olafson LXXIII removed Jarnbjorn from the corpse of a Frost Giant, the kill anything runes lit up like so many lanterns. Around him, his men finished the slaughter of the Frost Giants' trading outpost. A few humans had been caught in the rampage, but, hey - when all you see is red and all you hear is your own laughter as you dismember anything that moves, who can blame you if you accidentally kill a few bystanders?

Well, the law can blame you, but that's never stopped Olaf before!

Still, the blazing runes on his axe intrigued him and, as he scanned, the distant tundra, the antimagic runes on his breastplate began to shimmer faintly.

"Well. Looks like we got a mage. Saddel up, lads!" he called to his men. "We're on a magehunt!"

The cry went up and the horde of murderous bearded men charged across the desolate landscape.

[Myrdraxxis]

Magnus sighed and reached over, grabbing Jeff's phone. "What am I a glorified battery now?" He asked to no one in particular and charged a minor lightning spell, which jolted the cell phone.

"What device is that?" Ash asked in confusion.

"Don't worry 'bout it." Magnus replied, handing the phone back to Jeff. "Also Jeff, your phone might pick up Celestial wifi hotspots now, just a heads-up."

Magnus turned back in his seat.....and froze as he saw Cetis doing his mammoth dance. Panic began to show on the mage's face.

"You idiot." He all but whispered. "What have you done?"

As if in answer to his question, an ear-splitting sound suddenly filled the air; a terrible and all powerful trumpeting sound that shook the very soul with its finality, promising nothing less than a gruesome end.

Then the ground began to shake as music began to play. Magnus shakily stood from his sedan chair.

"Boss?" Desmond asked nervously. A massive shape appeared in the distance, growing steadily larger as it moved towards them. At great speeds. "What do we do?"

Magnus just gulped. "Survive."

A massive, hairy creature slammed to a halt before them, dwarfing the group with its gigantic size and slamming its feet into the ground and creating shockwaves as it did so.

Covered in a layer of brown fur that was littered with bones and dried blood. Massive pointed tusks that promised death. Baleful eyes full of hatred.

A Death-mammoth.

[Mizagium]

"Oh hey, thanks..." but, much like Magnus, Jeff suddenly became aware of the Death-Mammoth. Not through sight, however, or sound, or even the overpowering stench (of death and rotten flesh, of course) but by an overwhelming sense of doom. Like all the hope and optimism he might have felt suddenly evacuated its bowels and ran to the nearest toilet, only to find them all occupied, so it waited for a few minutes until one opened, only to find that there's no toilet paper and the previous guy clogged it, so, in a fit of absolute despair, it shoves its head in the bowel and swirlies itself so many times that it actually drowns in fecal-matter toilet water, pants full of its own feces and shame - without any toilet paper.

"What is that why am I afraid Magnus help?"

And remembering his sister made sense then; his life was struggling to flash before his eyes, but, like his hope, it was too busy drowning itself in contaminated toilet water.

"Ya-hah!"

Like a beacon of...well, not hope, since that killed itself, but...something like lesser hope, a cry came up from the tundra. A small band of fur-clad warriors were rapidly closing the distance, led by the most bearded man you've ever had the pleasure of witnessing. Olaf LXXXIII quickly closed the distance, outpacing his men, and brandished Jarnbjorn.

"Foul beast of the Various Hells! I will see you mounted - and then stuffed and mounted on my wall (if I had one)!"

[Sariel of Tevet]

The radars inside of the Hoboduo were going insane.

"Hmmm. My dear, it appears that there is a Death-Mammoth nearby. Perhaps we should be on the look ou.....Diane?"

Diane's usual graceful form had frozen. The fear radiating from the Death-Mammoth was so intense that it managed to stun the embodiment of Grace.

"DIANE! SNAP TO IT MY LOVE! WE HAVE TROUBLE HERE!"

She shook her head and came to.

"Right....right..."

She rubbed her brow with her fingers and muttered to herself.

"What just happened...Ali...Ali! What do we do? Even with all of us we can't possibly defeat a Death-Mammoth can we?"

The Dayman looked around the cockpit of Hobotron, frantically searching for a button to press the rescue them from the clutches of Death...Mammoth. He stood, taking his most natural royal pose and breached the air with his magnificent royal chest.

"Well if you can't beat them my dear, join them!"

He slammed a royal fist down upon a nearby button and the two Hobomechs began to creak and release steam. The cockpits remained relatively unshaken, but the rest of the Hobobots began to transform and reshape, eventually coming together. The cockpits mashed into one giant bridge and his wife was soon seated by his side.

"A...Ali what happened?"

"We joined them, my love."

She pressed her graceful face against the glass above the console and peered below, where she saw a robotic trunk hanging in the air, with tusks on either side. They were now seated inside of the Hobomammoth, which arguably smelled just as awful as death.

"N...no...we....this can't. Has that button always been there?"

[Calefrun]

Cetis leapt down from the back of Magnus' chair, thoroughly examining the Death-Mammoth he had summoned. "So, that's what they look like. Alright, then." He clapped his hands three times and then twirled around a bit, after which he placed one hand on his hip while using the other to point directly upwards. "MY TRUNK IS THE TRUNK THAT WILL PIERCE THE HEAVENS!" There was the flash of light which always accompanies one of the Illusive Squid's transformations, and after it ended there stood not a Squid, but another Death-Mammoth, identical to the first.

Cale Efrun the Illusive Mammoth charged at his look-alike, and delivered a fierce bitchslap with his trunk, the sheer force of which caused the ground to shake.

[Mizagium]

Jeff recovered from his hope-death, only to find two mammoths engaging in a earthshaking slap-fight. Sadly, not the weirdest thing he'd seen lately. Having to note that over and over again was starting to depress him.

Olaf, not breaking his stride, lept upon the nearest mammoth he saw, which happened to be Cale Efrun, the Illusive Mammoth. "Yah, ya demon! I'll see the lot of you flung into the burning soul of me ex-wife."

Not sure why he's talking like a pirate.

He raised Jarnbjorn and brought it down upon Cale's mammoth skull.

[Monika]

Since their battle with Lava Cthulga and arrival to Northyros, the overly rambunctious Sailor Eros had reverted to the calm, mild-mannered Hioma. She was perched carefully atop Zelmon's shoulders, her left arm covered by multiple compresses and bandages, and her right wrapped gently around the Pen of Love! and Notebook of Fate!

"Lady Hioma, are you alright up there?" Zelmon asked. Hioma hadn't said anything in several minutes, so he was rightfully concerned. He was answered by the sounds of soft, deep breathing. "Very well," he replied. "I suppose you've earned a rest after that last ordeal."

"Mammoths..."

"Hmm?" Zelmon looked upward. "Did you say something?"

"Northyros...home...Death-Mammoths...no survivors..."

"Is this where your mind wanders when you drift out of consciousness, milady? These dreams don't sound very-"

Before he could finish his sentence, Zelmon had somehow found himself in the middle of a not-unexpected scene involving a robotic mammoth, an illusive mammoth and, perhaps most frighteningly, a Death-Mammoth.

"-pleasant." He sighed. "Not even five minutes out of our last adventure and this happens. Well, if the sleep-induced mumblings of Lady Hioma are to be believed, we don't have a very good chance of defeating this monster. Of course, we have an equally negligible chance of outrunning it. Hmm..." Zelmon closed his eyes, drew in a deep breath and flexed his hands. When he opened his eyes, he noticed that his hands were cloaked in pink flames that occasionally took the shape of hearts. "Well that's new. Let's hope I can still do this." He stretched his arms outward and, moments later, he and Hioma were surrounded by a pink, heart shaped barrier. "Please wake up soon, milady. I can only hold this barrier for so long."

Meanwhile, Sarina casually approached Jeff and nonchalantly asked "So I'm guessing you haven't ridden one of those before?" She wasn't particularly concerned; she had witnessed things that were far more atrocious during her time in the Awesome Land Imperial Army. To her, the sight of a Death-Mammoth was more intriguing than anything else.

[Calefrun]

Cale Efrun the Illusive Mammoth was so focused on his slap fight with the Death Mammoth that he almost didn't notice the light tap on his head. Annoyed nonetheless by the minor distraction, he formed a tentacle from his back and wrapped it around Olaf, then proceeded to fling him at the other mammoth.

[Myrdraxxis]

"Should....should we do something?" Desmond asked. The trio of novice magic users and full-time minions watched the battle with horrified fascination, like one might watch a car crash. A car crash with a great deal of swearing and fur.

"I think the others have it sorted." Ash offered, glancing from CETIS to the Dayman's latest nightmare contraption. Leske glanced over at their boss to get his opinion, seeing Magnus staring at the ground thoughtfully.

"What should we do?" Leske asked.

"I was seriously giving though to just sneaking away now and leaving these people behind to deal with this." Magnus responded in a distracted manner.

Leske chuckled for a moment, then trailed off as Magnus' expression didn't waver.

"I'm serious."

Before Leske could respond the Death Mamoth was suddenly entangled by a swarm of ghostly chains that trapped it to the ground. The beast let out a terrible sound and struggled. Magnus blinked. "Huh. That's new.."

"Why do you always manage to attract the worst sort of trouble?" A voice said from behind the mages. Magnus sighed.

"Aaaaaand Septimus is here now. Wonderful."

"So glad to see you too Magnus." Septimus responded dryly. "Now if Imight suggest that we leave before that thing breaks loose...."

[Mizagium]

Olaf grunted, quickly recovering from the recoil off of the Illusive Mammoth's skull. "What treachery. A beast my axe cannot kill? What manner of Demon are you?" The rest of his men finally managed to catch up. The Viking Lord now had a small force with him, albeit out of breath and sweating.

Then he noticed Septimus. "Oh good. A Magister." He readied his axe again and his men did the same.

Jeff recovered some of his toilet-drowned sanity. "What. You just. The mammoth. Chains. That...something about that doesn't seem...right. Magnus, what's happening?"